A LEADING Welsh brewery has produced an invaluable "insiders' guide to getting served" in crowded Christmas bars.

A LEADING Welsh brewery has produced an invaluable "insiders' guide to getting served" in crowded Christmas bars.

Swansea-based Hurns Brewing Company, which makes Tomos Watkin ales, has surveyed 100 bar staff to find out what irritates them and what attracts their eye.

Using the results, Hurns has compiled this definitive list of dos and don'ts for quicker queuing.

To get served faster:

Make and maintain eye contact (according to 48% of bar staff questioned);

Smile and look friendly (17%);

Have your money ready and visible (14%);

Wait quietly and patiently (12%); and,

Bring your empties back to the bar.

How NOT to get served quicker

Wave your hands, click your fingers or whistle to get attention;

Flash or wave your cash around dramatically;

Interrupt a barworker while they are serving someone else;

Tell a barmaid/man who to serve next; and,

Be too busy talking with friends to know it's your turn.

Hurns spoke to bar workers from Swansea, Cardiff, Newport, Caerphilly, Milford Haven, Neath Port Talbot and Llanelli asking them for the best tactics which customers could employ to get quickservice.

For the best chance of speedy service the "earnest and eager" approach is thought to be the best.

The earnest and eager style should involve making plenty of eye contact with the bar staff.

Have your money ready and visible and try to bring your empties to the bar because this will demonstrate how considerate you are and that you understand a bar worker's job is a tough one, particularly when it's busy.

Phil Parry, managing director of the Hurns Brewing Company, said that the "bold and bossy" approach involving clicking fingers and gesticulating wildly are more likely to put bar staff off.

Mr Parry said, "It's our business to understand the dynamics of bar and pub culture.

"Queuing and interacting with bar staff are a key component of going out for a drink so we conducted this research to see if we could throw any light on the age old problem of not being able to get served at the bar.

"We were hoping it would enable us to offer our customers a head start when they're out socialising this Christmas.

"Ultimately we want them to be the first to be served with a pint of Tomos Watkin.

"For many of the bar staff we spoke to, it's fundamentally about respect.

"They feel that if a customer is not paying them attention by talking to friends while queuing, or is rude or pushy, then they are not showing them the level of respect they deserve. This understandably gets their backs up.

"Ultimately, a common sense approach is what is required.

"However, after a few drinks, common sense sometimes goes out of the window and is replaced by impatience or aggression. Both of which will spell disaster in terms of queuing etiquette.

"This research shows that demonstrating a bit of reverence to the bar staff this Christmas will work wonders."

Nigel Stanford-Hill, manager of the Cayo Arms in Cathedral Road, Cardiff, has been in the licensed trade for the past 14 years.

Having long experience on the service side of the bar,he believes the number one piece of behaviour guaranteed not to help thirsty customers get served quickly is when they use a mobile phone while queuing up.

He said, "To be honest I have said to customers, 'I'll get back to you when you've finished your conversation'.

"A lot of people get annoyed by people speaking into their mobiles on the train.

"But it's worse in a busy bar with lots of people waiting if you take an order from a customer who then says 'hold on a minute' and you have to wait until the customer's call is finished.

"I think for me people who flash their cash around are not helping themselves, particularly if they wave it in your face.

"The best tip is to waitpatiently - well trained bar staff will spot the order in which people arrive at the bar and will serve them accordingly."

Brewing giants Guinness who have also investigated the best way to get served have found most staff find it acceptable for the customer to lean over the bar, but only at a 45-degree angle. Any more is considered straying into staff territory.

And being courteous is a big help.

More than a quarter of staff in Irish pubs said they would return to a customer who has pointed out a person beside them as being next.